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Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe (ca. 1640 - 1700) was a French composer and violist.

It is speculated by various scholars that Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe was of Lyonnaise or Burgundian petty nobility; and also the selfsame 'Jean de Sainte-Colombe' noted as the father of 'Monsieur de Saint Colombe le fils'. This assumption was erroneous as proved by subsequent research taken on by Jonathan Dunford in Paris.^[1] In fact he was probably from the Pau area in southernmost France and Protestant; his first name was "Jean". His two daughters were named Brigide and Françoise.^[2]

Sainte-Colombe was vastly celebrated as a veritable master of the viola da gamba, for he did not merely master the instrument, but also improved upon it: he is acclaimed as having added the seventh string (AA) on the bass viol.

In accordance with the celebrated aloofness of Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe, he is claimed to have performed only occasional concerts and exclusively at his home, in consort with his two daughters, whom he had trained. Aside from them, Sainte-Colombe's students included the Sieur de Danoville, Jean Desfontaines, Pierre Méliton, Jean Rousseau, and, most notably, Marin Marais, who wrote Tombeau pour Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe in 1701 as homage to his instructor.

Amongst the extant works of Sainte-Colombe are sixty-seven Concerts à deux violes esgales, and over 170 pieces for solo seven-string viol, making him the most prolific of French viol composers before Marin Marais.

In 1991, Pascal Quignard wrote a book inspired by the life of Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe entitled Tous les matins du monde (All the World's Mornings). Alain Corneau directed a film on it, with Jean-Pierre Marielle as Sainte-Colombe, Guillaume Depardieu as the young and Gérard Depardieu as the aged Marin Marais. The soundtrack of the film was realized by Jordi Savall.

A quotation from a composition of Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe is used in Carlo Forlivesi's Requiem (1999).

Notes

References

• Vaast, C. and F.P. Goy (1998), "Introduction," in Sainte-Colombe, Concerts à deux violes esgales (Ed. P. Hooreman, 2nd ed. revised by J. Dunford). Paris: Société Française de Musicologie.
• Patrice Connelly, Historical treatises on viola da gamba
• Dunford, Jonathan: ' Jean de Sainte-Colombe, Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macey (accessed December 20, 2005).

External links

• Free scores by Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe in the Werner Icking Music Archive (WIMA)
• Hoasm.org biography